Student-Athlete Of The Month: Dash Havens

By day, Dash Havens is a model student with a perfect 4.0 unweighted GPA (4.53 weighted) who participates in Severna Park’s student-athlete leadership council.

By “night,” he’s a three-sport standout (football, basketball, lacrosse) for the Falcons, an intern at a local golf course, and an SAT tutor.

But where he’s happiest, perhaps, is on the water.

“During COVID, my brother Leo and I were looking for stuff to do, so we saved up a bunch of money mowing lawns and stuff like that, and we bought a little maybe 14-foot skiff with a 15-horsepower motor so we could go fishing,” Havens said. “We go out on the Severn a lot, and I really enjoy being on the water.”

The water is peaceful amid a hectic high school life, though when he’s in the throes of it, Havens is all-in.

Last summer, he tutored students in the SAT through a platform called Schoolhouse World. It helped him sharpen his own study skills for the test, but it also unlocked a new perspective that he hopes to carry forward with him.

“Everyone views (the SAT) as a national test, but there are people from all around the world,” he said. “I had students from Japan and Canada, so that was a really cool experience for me. I felt like I had some success with the SAT and I wanted to share that. If you teach something, you also master it a little bit more. To be able to explain problems and break them down into simpler terms for people to understand was really rewarding.”

Between tutoring, fishing, working his golf internship and taking the typical senior half schedule, Havens has worked out how best to manage the finite number of hours in his day.

But the athletic field was a real sanctuary during his junior year, where a full schedule is required but the accelerated rigor can chew up a ton of precious time and energy.

“It's my brain break. Junior year was probably a little heavier with a lot of work, but for a couple of hours I can have a little mental break playing my sports,” he said. “I think it started when I was 3. Everyone signs up for a couple of sports, and my parents signed me up for a lot. I played everything from soccer to tennis to baseball and lacrosse, and I didn’t play football until my freshman year. I think they just wanted me to experience a lot and find what I really enjoyed, and I was able to narrow it down to three before high school.”

While he plays all three at a high level, Havens accepts that lacrosse is probably his best bet if he wants to continue playing in college, where he is thinking about studying business and finance. Because of Severna Park’s lacrosse history, the depth of talent in the area, and the relative difficulty in being recruited for football or basketball locally, he’ll keep the stick and gloves if it works out.

But he’s at peace with whatever happens, regardless.

“My goal is to go to the best academic school possible. Even though I’ve played sports my whole life, it’s been academics first, and sports will come with it,” Havens said. “If I can use a sport to get into the best school possible, that’d be great, and if that doesn’t work out and I’m just going to a great school, then that’s the option for me.”

Next Step Realty